


A Day in the Life of Philip Coulson, Age 14 and 2/3

by orphan_account



Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe, Superman - All Media Types, Supernatural, The Avengers (2012)
Genre: Alternate Universe - High School, Friendship, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-05-15
Updated: 2013-05-15
Packaged: 2017-12-11 23:09:52
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,292
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/804313
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Exactly what is says on the tin. </p><p>AKA I See Your Canon And I Reject It Entirely</p><p>AKA If You Get All The References I'll Give You A Cookie</p>
            </blockquote>





	A Day in the Life of Philip Coulson, Age 14 and 2/3

Philip Coulson was the kind of boy who woke up five minutes before his alarm went off. He liked that feeling of organisation and control that came from starting his day ahead of schedule. He would never get up before his alarm went off, that would be silly, but he would lie in bed and run through the events of the day to make sure that he had everything prepared.

Philip’s alarm went off at precisely six-thirty every morning and he had never once hit the snooze button. Mostly because his father had made the clock for him and he hadn’t built a snooze button. Because only losers snoozed. Philip was extremely proud of his alarm clock; it was a perfect circle, shaped like Captain America’s vibranium shield. The numbers glowed inside the star at the centre and the alarm played ‘The Star-Spangled Banner’. It was the best birthday present he had ever received.

Philip was the only child of an FBI agent and neurosurgeon, as such he spent a great deal of time by himself. At the age of fourteen he was roughly as accomplished a cook as most grown men. He could also repair just about anything in the house and, two years earlier, when his parents had refused his request for cable TV, he had hijacked his neighbour’s line and routed it to his bedroom television. None of them had ever noticed.

Philip lived about a mile and a half from his school and even though some of the other kids told him he was mad, he always walked to school. A friend of his, Lois, had written a big expose for the school newspaper about how much thinner the student body would be if students were encouraged to walk. Mostly though, Philip walked because of ‘Retarded Tardis’. Retarded Tardis was the local comic book store run by an eccentric, British man by the name of Bilbo. Philip liked to walk past Retarded Tardis in the mornings so that he could check the deliveries, then he would know when the new Captain America comic came in. He had been collecting them for so long that Bilbo had one sitting on the counter waiting for him when he stopped in on his way home.

J. Edgar Hoover High was a perfectly normal high school with just over one thousand students, a collection of teachers ranging from engaged to utterly useless, and a football team that never failed to disappoint. There were all the usual cliques; the jocks, the geeks, the plastics, the cool Asians, the art crowd, and then there was that rare collection of teenagers who were so perfectly normal that they certainly couldn’t be called cool, but neither did they fit easily into any of the more derogatory boxes assigned by bored, spiteful teenagers. They were known simply as ‘those guys’. Unsurprisingly, this was Philip Coulson’s gang.

It was a select group that fluctuated in size each year, and right now there were only four of them. Philip Coulson, straight-laced and eminently proper but endearing nonetheless, Lois Lane, an enterprising would-be reporter who secretly believed in UFOs, Jasper Sitwell, who was already going bald and wore suits to school every day, and Sam Winchester, who had arrived only a week ago and kept swearing that he wouldn’t be around too long.

Philip’s first class was English. He liked English normally, but they were studying Hamlet so the whole process had slowed to an interminable crawl while the teacher ‘translated the lines into English’ for everyone else. Philip sat near the back, opened the book to the correct page, then flipped open his binder, in which he had safely concealed this week’s Captain America comic. He had read it about six times already but he still loved the artwork. The teacher’s voice faded to a dull drone at the back of his mind.

“Coulson? Coulson!”

Philip heard his name and he glanced up. The key now was not to look flustered; that would be a giveaway. “Yes, sir?”

“Have you been following, Coulson?”

“Of course, sir.”

“Then, if you wouldn’t mind, could you read out the section we were just discussing?”

Philip glanced up at the clock, then down at the book on his desk, and began some rather rapid calculations. Time since class started, average time spent on each page in previous classes, divide one by the other, and there it was, the number of pages covered since class began. Philip picked up his book and flipped forward six pages, scanning quickly. Take a deep breath. Don’t look nervous. Leap.

“Alas, poor Yorrick...”

“Fine, thank you, Coulson.” The teacher had already lost interest. He turned back to the rest of the class and Philip turned back to his comic.

“Hey, how did you do that?” Sam Winchester whispered from the seat next to him.

Philip looked up in surprise. “It’s averages,” he shrugged. “No big deal.”

“I bet it wouldn’t have occurred to anyone else in here,” Sam pointed out.

“That’s why I don’t bother with anyone else in here.”

“What are you reading?”

Philip flipped the binder to show him the open page. “He’s definitely the best.”

But Sam was shaking his head and he responded by lifting up one of his books to reveal a comic of his own. “Batman forever.”

“No way! Bruce Wayne is a sissy. He doesn’t even have any superpowers.”

“Exactly! He’s a genius, billionaire, playboy, philanthropist. He’s even more heroic than all these guys with special powers because he has to rely on his own wit.”

Philip blew a raspberry and shook his head. “Bruce Wayne is a Gary Stu with a big bank account. Steve Rogers is a true American hero.”

“Alas, poor Yorrick, it seems some of my students have something more interesting to discuss than dear Hamlet. Would you like to share your insights with the rest of the class, boys?”

Philip’s mind went blank but Sam winked at him. “Actually sir, we were just discussing Hamlet’s descent into madness as a metaphor reflecting the turbulent politics that surrounded Shakespeare while he was writing the play.”

“Of course you were.” Their teacher blinked at them, then shrugged and Philip could almost see him deciding to just leave them to it.

He turned to Sam with a grin. “That was wicked.”

The rest of the day rolled along much as school days do, with the fluorescent lights and the crowds in the halls and grey food in the cafeteria and Philip tried not to imagine the far distant future when he wouldn’t have to do this anymore. He didn’t hate it, Philip didn’t really hate anything, it just seemed that he spent most of his time at school surrounded by people acting wilfully stupid and he found the whole thing a bit tedious.

His last class of the day was art, and this was a bit like English for him; in theory it should have been great, but in actuality it was a tepid disappointment. Philip had a secret, one that he had kept even from his parents. Not that they would have noticed anyway. He wanted to be a graphic artist. More specifically, he wanted to be a comic book artist for Marvel Comics. His art teacher had given them a new project; to tell a story with their art, so Philip had bright in his graphic novel pages and worked on that. When his art teacher wasn’t sniffing at the ‘pedestrian’ nature of graphic art, then she was bemoaning Philip’s literal interpretation of her request for them to tell a story. The day he watched his teacher tear up over another work involving leaves and litter was the day that Philip knew he and this teacher would never see eye-to-eye. It didn’t really bother him anymore.

“Coulson, what is that?” his teacher’s nasal whine sounded close to his ear and Philip jumped.

He looked down at the page, suddenly self-conscious. “It’s a new character I’m working on.”

“Is he supposed to be albino?” the teacher asked with a certain sneer in her voice.

“He’s called ‘the Winter Soldier’. He was Steve Rogers’ best friend during the war, James Barnes, but he fell from a train during one of their missions, presumed dead. But he wasn’t dead, see? He was picked up by Soviet forces and brainwashed so now he’s a bad guy. And possibly he hooked up with the Black Widow, I’m not really sure yet, but anyway, the denouement of the first book is-,”

“Yes, thank you, Coulson, that is quite sufficient.”

Philip smiled; people who liked the sound of their own voices never could stand to listen to other people for too long. His teacher wandered off, smacking his face with her fur stole as she swept past, and Philip returned his attention to his work. He had been proud of the Winter Soldier, his first original character but now he was worried. After all, by the time that Bucky was killed in the comics, the Soviets were already on the side of the Allies, so why hadn’t they turned him back over to the Americans. Could he claim that it was late enough in the war that the Russians already knew that they were going to defeat the Axis and they were worried about how Europe would be divided after the war? Would anyone believe the Russians planned that far ahead? And what, exactly, were the Captain and Bucky doing on a train in Soviet Russia? How did they justify that target? Philip shook his head to try and clear it, but the warm glow he always got from working on his comic had faded somewhat and he was left feeling strangely deflated. Stuff never sounded as good out loud.

The bell went a few minutes later and Philip gathered up his things, only too happy to be getting out. He ducked past his teacher without a word and she didn’t even look at him, as though his ‘pedestrian’ art had reduced him to a state so far beneath her that she couldn’t even see him. That was just the way Philip liked it.

Lois Lane caught up to him in the hallway, her face lighting up as she came alongside. “There you are, I haven’t seen you all day.”

“We saw each other at lunch,” Philip noted.

“Oh, I know.” Lois reached out to wrap her hands around Philip’s arm. He glanced down but decided to ignore it; she had started doing this recently and he couldn’t quite fathom why. “But we don’t have any classes together on a Wednesday. It sucks!”

Philip nodded, guessing that less would be more in this instance. “How was your day?” he asked after a beat, leading her out of the front entrance.

“Well, I’m chasing this story for the newspaper, about what’s really in the cafeteria burgers...”

Philip was listening as they started their walk home, just enough to know when to nod and when to make his various array of noises, conciliatory or sympathetic or indignant, but not so much that he couldn’t think about anything else. He was excited because he was getting the next Captain America comic today.

They reached the point where their paths diverged and Lois hesitated, still holding on to Philip’s arm. “Well, I guess I’ll see you tomorrow,” she murmured. There was a weird, sort of hopeful look in her eyes but Philip couldn’t figure out what it meant.

“Yeah, see ya,” he answered, detaching himself from her grip and giving her a little wave.

Lois’ face dropped and Philip suspected that somewhere in the exchange he had just done something wrong, but he had no idea what it was. “Bye.” Her voice was so soft he almost didn’t hear it.

But Philip didn’t spend too long dwelling on it. As he walked away his thoughts turned to the Retarded Tardis and the new Captain America comic that was waiting for him there. Philip was practically running by the time he reached the store.

“Is it here?” he called to Bilbo.

“Course it’s here, why wouldn’t it be here?” The response was brusquer than usual, but Bilbo was busy reading the new Black Widow comic. Philip was beginning to suspect that really he just liked it for the pictures.

“Can I see it?” Philip came up to the counter and reverentially picked up the comic book that had been waiting for him all day. It didn’t matter how many times he did this, he was still excited, every week. He imagined this must be what Christmas felt like for other kids.

“Oh hey, guess what else showed up.” Bilbo finally managed to tear his eyes away from the Black Widow and reached down under the desk to pull out a trading card.

It was a picture of Captain America, with his striped shield and a grin on his face as he waved a little salute. It was vintage. It was rare. Philip Coulson dropped his comic book.

“How much?” he asked, reaching out with reverential hands towards the card.

But Bilbo wasn’t having any of it. He whipped the card back and out of Philip’s reach before he could blink. “Significantly more than you can afford.”

“I would give anything to have that card.”

“Then give me all your gold. Oh wait, you don’t have any.”

“Seriously though, how much?”

Bilbo pondered for a while, stroking his fluffy, underdeveloped beard. “$300.”

Philip sighed heavily and stared down at the floor. “You’re right, that is more than I can afford.”

Bilbo glanced at him and after a moment of contemplation he seemed to relent. “Tell you what, though. Since you’re such a good customer and I know how much you want this, I’ll give you a week to get the money. A week where I don’t show it to anyone else, don’t tell them I have it, don’t even tell them I might possibly be able to get it in the near future. And if you can get the money together in a week, then it’s yours.”

“You mean it?” Philip asked, eyes lighting up as he stared at Bilbo.

“I guess I have to now, don’t I? Turning you down would be like kicking a puppy,” Bilbo muttered.

“I’ll get that money, you wait and see!” Philip was so excited he was almost bouncing. So excited that he almost left without this week’s comic. As he came back to the counter Bilbo was smiling.

“What are you going to do if you come back to me short by exactly how much this comic book costs?” Bilbo asked.

Philip smiled back at him. “I won’t be.”

“Alright, cocky, one week from today. Impress me.”

Philip slipped his new Captain America comic into his bag and nodded. “It’s all taken care of.”

“But remember,” Bilbo called out as he reached the door. “If Coulson loses we eats it whole.”

Philip stopped in the doorway, looking perplexed. “Whatever you say.”

-+-

He had a couple of other errands to run; both of his parents were going to be home for dinner and he wanted to make an effort, but Philip was home with enough time to get his homework done before he had to start cooking. He had to resist the urge to pick up his Captain America, but the first time he read it he liked to do it all in one sitting, unhurried, undisturbed.

He was making his mother’s favourite; beef and pineapple fajitas. She had invented it while she was pregnant with Philip and having one of her stranger cravings, but the dish had turned out so well that she had continued to make it. Philip remembered her teaching it to him when he was twelve years old, how simple it had been. That was the summer when his mother had broken her foot and had to take a month off work. It had been the best summer of his life.

“Phil? Are you cooking?” That was the sound of his mother’s voice, followed by her tired, smiling face in the doorway. Angela Coulson was always smiling. His dad said that was what made her such a good doctor; she brought hope to her patients with that smile. All Philip knew was that it made him feel better any time he was ill. “It smells wonderful,” Angela noted, coming forward to kiss Philip on the top of the head. He was too tall for it now, but neither of them ever mentioned that, unless she did it in front of his friends, then it was a different story.

“It should be ready in about ten minutes, will Dad be home in time?” Philip asked.

Angela nodded, plucking a pineapple hunk from the pile on the countertop. “He called me from the car, should be five minutes. How was school?”  
“It was good; we learned about fractals today.”

“Goodness, I have no idea what they are. I suppose we must have done them in school back in my day. They’re not a recent invention, are they?”

“No.” Philip smiled. “At least, not that recent.”

“And what about English class, are you still studying the Bard?”

“Yep.”

“Still bored?”

“Yep.”

“Oh honey. Well, just remember what Polonius says; ‘Look thou character, Give thy thoughts no tongue, Nor any unproportioned thought his act.’”

“I know.”

“But ‘this above all – to thine own self be true; and it must follow, as the night the day, thou canst not then be false to any man.’” Peter Coulson’s deep, booming voice sounded across the room as he arrived in, still with coat and briefcase in hand.

“Hey honey,” Angela called.

Peter came over to kiss her on the cheek and patted Philip on the shoulder. “Hey kid, what are you doing cooking that crazy stuff? You’re not pregnant, are you?”

Philip smiled, twirling the spatula between his fingers. “Well Dad, I was going to wait until after dinner, but since you ask...”

Both of his parents laughed and Philip felt better than he had all day. Here in this place he was warm and safe and nothing truly bad could ever happen to him.

They chatted while he cooked, setting the table and trading stories. They asked him about school; his mother asked about his friends while his father asked about his homework. The responses were short but enough to please both of them. His mother always said it was rude to pry. They lingered over dinner, opened a bottle of wine, even let Philip try some, though he couldn’t help but make a face. He couldn’t quite understand the interest in alcohol; it was either sour or else it stank. But this just made his parents laugh harder and his father clapped him on the shoulder and assured him that his views would all change soon enough. They went from dinner to the living room and found themselves watching ‘Spy Game’, which they had seen twice before but it was Philip’s favourite movie and neither of his parents was about to complain.

But finally the movie ended and the conversation wound down and thoughts started to turn to the morning after, to early alarms and new patients and heavy case loads and brand new comic books. Philip went upstairs and settled himself in bed to read the newest Captain America. He hadn’t noticed how tired he was until he found his eyes drifting shut in between pages. He fell asleep with just three pages to go. His mother noticed, walking past the open door about twenty minutes later. She picked up the comic book and laid it carefully on the bedside table, then she kissed her son on the forehead and switched out the light.


End file.
